Want to own a restaurant? Wisconsin pizza company looking for Kalamazoo franchise owners

Courtesy of Toppers PizzaToppers Pizza, a 26-unit pizza restaurant chain, is looking for people in Kalamazoo who want to open their own franchises.KALAMAZOO — A Wisconsin-based pizza franchising company, Toppers Pizza, says it plans to expand throughout Michigan in the coming years.

“Kalamazoo is one of those places that we feel could be a home run for a Toppers franchisee,” said Scott Iversen, Toppers’ director of franchise development.

The company targets areas with large populations of college-age people, aged 18 to 25.

“Kalamazoo has some very good demographics,” Iversen said, because of Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo College and Kalamazoo Valley Community College.

Toppers is in an expansion mode. It has 26 stores now (seven are company-owned) and has 15 under contract in Wisconsin, Illinois and Minnesota that will open over the next two years, Iversen said.

The company doubled its revenue and number of stores between 2007 and 2009, he said.

Toppers is expanding now because so many of the costs to open a pizza restaurant are lower because of the recession, Iversen said.

“It’s a great time because there are great real estate spots available,” he said. “Construction costs are down. Commodities costs are down. There’s prime real estate available.”

Toppers has not signed up any franchise owners in Michigan and Iversen said the company hopes to find a franchisee who wants to open stores in Michigan’s college towns, such as Kalamazoo, East Lansing and Ann Arbor.

Iversen said the average Toppers Pizza location rings up about $900,000 in annual sales. The initial investment to open a Toppers is about $400,000, he said.

"We’ve just got a model that’s providing a great return for franchisees," he said.

Another pizza chain, Happy's Pizza, which is based in Farmington Hills, plans to open a new Kalamazoo franchise in the next four months.